The Almost Companion (expanded version)
by aces
Summary: An interesting new way to look at the Doctor...I think. I hope.


The Almost Companion

I said I'd do more with this story eventually...and finally I found the time and inspiration, so here it is. I think it's the most interesting piece I've done (but knowing me, that's utter bullocks)--it certainly gives a different look at the Doctor. At least, I hope and think it does, treating him not as the universal traveler but as a…guy. Take it as A/U (alternative universe? With the Doctor's continuity? I could probably get away with setting it somewhere in the midst of the NAs and BBC books and comics and audio CDs and whatever else and no one would really be able to dispute it) in the 8th Doctor's lifetime. I'm not sure how interesting it'll be for other readers...hopefully interesting enough you'll keep reading. Anyway, I own nothing except the almost companion and her acerbic wit (*snort*), and I make no profit from anything, not even the almost companion and her acerbic wit. And I've really gotta cut down on these lengthy and boring introductions.

The Almost Companion

It was a gorgeous spring day, and I was sitting alone outside a little cafe like I do every lunchtime, reading, when he sat down across from me.

I looked up at him, pushing the strands of straight brown hair out of my face, and said simply, "Yes?"

I've never been one for beating around the bush. Or nonconfrontation, either.

He smiled at me. It was possibly one of the most beautiful smiles I have ever seen, childlike in its innocence, carefree in its nature. But he looked a decade older than me, and I was twenty-seven. Maybe he was mad. He looked it, in that velvet coat and paisley vest and silk cravat. Sexy, yes, but definitely a bit daft.

"You looked like you could use some company," he told me, still grinning at me. Even his voice was beautiful. I was beginning to think he was a mirage--maybe I'd been sitting in the sun too long? "D'you often sit here alone, reading, like this?"

I glanced down at my book, something by Douglas Adams. "Yes," I said, looking up again blandly. "Everyday for lunch. Why?"

"I thought so," he answered. He leant forward a little across the table. "I could tell, you know. You've got a very set look about you, like this is an old habit of yours." He sat back, beaming at me again. "And I saw you here, in the same exact spot, yesterday."

I glanced up sharply at that. "Have you been watching me?" It didn't occur to me to ask how the hell I'd gotten into this conversation. I've since learned that often happens with him. You even forget to notice how weird his clothes are.

He shook his head, golden-brown curls bouncing. He really was beautiful, with his pale skin and mournful eyes and long hair and wrong-century clothes. "Not really. You looked lonely."

I scowled. "I'm not. I like being alone," I added pointedly. I heard the church bell somewhere behind me tolling the hour. I stood up, gathering my book and purse. "And I have to get back to work, so if you'll excuse me..."

He caught my hand. I glared at him as angrily as I could. He turned my hand around so he could shake it, refusing to let go of my hand or let me look away from his clear blue eyes. "I'm the Doctor," he said in that distinctly wonderful accent. "Why don't I have lunch with you tomorrow?"

I stared at him, racking my brains for a thought, any thought. This was too surreal and unusual an occurrence; I had no idea how to react. He was too forward, too strange...and yet he seemed utterly harmless.

And it'd been a long time since I'd had lunch with anyone. Let alone exchanged more than a "hello, how are you, good-bye" with anybody.

"Come if you like," I gruffly said at last, surprising myself but somehow managing to keep that from showing on my face. "I always eat here."

And with that, I swept away.

* * *

He was waiting for me, at my table, the next day. So he was real then--he even wore what appeared to be the same waistcoat and velvet frock coat from the day before.

I sat down across from him, feeling distinctly apprehensive and…scared? I felt like I was letting myself in for something too big to deal with, though what, I couldn't imagine.

I was never one to back down easily. "Hello again," I said, picking up the menu even though I knew exactly what I was going to order. I always knew in advance. But it gave my eyes something to occupy themselves with.

He looked up from reading his own menu, his face a picture of intense concentration, and smiled, the puckering frown of his forehead clearing. "Hullo," he answered cheerfully. "I'm glad you came."

"I told you," I retorted a trifle brusquely, "I always come here." I didn't want to let him know I was nervous.

"I was afraid I might have driven you away," he answered lightly, and I looked up at that, wondering how many others he'd driven away. "What are the salads like here?"

The waiter was utterly confused and put out by the strange man eating with me at my table, but he managed well enough under the circumstances. When he left, I faced the Doctor squarely and said, "What do you want?"

He looked confused. "What do you mean?"

"Why're you here? Who are you? What do you want from me? Why'd you come back? Why'd you sit down here yesterday in the first place? Why were you watching me? Why--"

"Stop!" he cried, his hands leaping up to ward off any more questions. He was laughing. "Stop _please_! So many questions." He considered me a moment, still amused, then asked, "What's your name?"

"You're stalking me and you don't even know my name?" I asked in disbelief, raising my eyebrows.

"I'm not stalking you," he replied. "And I don't know your name."

"Carrie," I told him. "Carrie Evans."

"Well, Carrie, let me see if I can answer some of your questions." He paused, looking around as if for inspiration or to gather his thoughts, then looked me in the eye again. He had an unnerving habit of doing that--unnerving perhaps because _I_ was used to being the one who disarmed and intimidated people by meeting their gaze head on. "I noticed you on Monday, when I came here for lunch. You were scowling even though you were reading a Douglas Adams novel, a man who I find can make anyone laugh. And you were completely ignoring the sun, the sky, the breeze, the people around you--everything that was making the day wonderful. I was interested, so I came back yesterday to see if you'd be here again. And you were. So I decided to make your acquaintance."

"Why?" I asked again, confining myself simply to that.

He shrugged gracefully, the sun doing interesting things to the velvet of his coat. I wondered if he was sweating under all that heavy material. He didn't look hot. "I was curious. My curiosity always gets the better of me. And you looked like you needed a friend." He smiled, a different smile from his innocently happy one. It didn't seem quite so innocent or happy. "I'm good at making friends."

I shook my head to clear it. "You're mad," I said.

"I don't think so," was the easy reply. "I have been, and people have tried to make me feel I am, but I'm not really."

"Do you at least have a name?" I decided not to even _ask_ about that last remark.

He smiled again, gently this time, maybe even wistfully. "The Doctor suits me best. It's who I am."

"Why did you think I needed a friend?" I hadn't meant to ask that.

Before he could answer, his salad and my chicken sandwich arrived. After the waiter left us alone again, still shooting the occasional startled look at the Doctor, the man himself said to me, "The way you were sitting at your table alone--the way you never seemed to smile at another customer or the waiter--you seemed like someone who needed to have a person to make you laugh."

I snorted. "I don't laugh much," I informed him.

"There you go," the Doctor grinned and popped a mouthful of greens into his mouth. "Is that why you're reading _Mostly Harmless_? To make yourself laugh?"

"My sister recommended it to me. She also seems to think I need to loosen up."

"You don't seem to find it very amusing."

I allowed myself a tight smile. "It has its moments."

He nodded thoughtfully. "I think your sister's right. You _do _need to loosen up a little."

I scowled. "I _don't_ need strangers telling me how to behave."

He looked at me approvingly. "Quite right. I agree entirely. One of the reasons I left Gallifrey--they were always telling me how to act 'properly.'"

"Gallifrey? Weird name for a school." But then, England had weird private schools. Or so I assumed.

"That's because it isn't a school," he answered coolly. "Perhaps I'll tell you about it someday. When you don't consider me a stranger."

"You think that's likely to happen? That I won't consider you a stranger?" I asked acerbically.

He smiled widely. "It often does I find."

"You've just got such a magnetic personality," I couldn't resist saying with a sardonic smile.

"Perhaps," he grinned conspiratorially back.

I found myself relaxing slightly after that, making small talk with the Doctor. He seemed to know about everything--all the books I mentioned, music, TV shows, current events. He was witty, intelligent, passionate--but he always listened when I spoke. And he let me speak. He seemed to hear everything, notice everything.

I suddenly realized I was late for work. I scrambled around for my things, the Doctor helping me, and was about to rush off. But I paused and turned back and said uncertainly, hating myself for that uncertainty, hating myself for both the hope and dread I felt at what his answer might be, "Coming tomorrow?"

A slow grin spread across his face. Gawd he was gorgeous. I wanted to cuddle him like an overgrown teddy bear. "Of course," he answered simply.

I found myself grinning back.

* * *

We had lunch together everyday after that, except the weekends. And after a while we started doing other stuff on the weekends--going to the (fairly) local dunes, or just wandering about the city parks, watching movies at my place, going to museums, taking drives...utterly random, normal things, but he took such delight in doing them they became almost magical. I began wondering what he did on a _normal_ day.

He was a fascinating companion--friend. We could talk about practically anything, ranging from incredibly intense discussions about religion and politics and history and philosophy to utterly silly, absurd conversations about inept sadists and pet names for cars (Foofoo being a particular favorite of mine). I don't think I'd ever laughed so much in my life. Or gotten so many headaches from such intense, dizzying thinking. He could slide right around all kinds of arguments; he was always trying to get me to change my mind about certain things, like isolationist policies and leaving things well alone, and the uselessness of humanity, and why friendship was a really bad thing. It was like he was trying to reform my cynicism or something.

Sometimes when we met up with each other at a lunch date or on a weekend, he would show up moody--angry or sad or so deep in some thought that I was afraid to ask about it, simply because of how he looked--old, ancient, as if he were Atlas and the world was weighing down his shoulders. I didn't know what his job was; it was obviously something that had moments of severe stress. But somehow he always eventually cheered up--it couldn't have been because of me, as I was never a cheerful person. In fact, he invariably ended up cheering _me_ up in the process when he did himself.

I was reading the paper once, waiting for him to show up for lunch. When he did arrive, a heavy frown on his face, he glanced at my paper, then snatched it from me and read the article about a local murder done by a gang that had occurred the night before.

"Humans!" he exploded. "Why must you be so violent? Something doesn't go your way, the situation becomes too difficult or complicated, and your immediate reaction is violence! Will you never _learn_?!"

He'd said similar things before, as if he _weren't_ human. And when I considered it, I sometimes had the odd premonition that he _couldn't_ be human. Human was too easy a thing for him. Or maybe too complicated. He could be a very confusing person to think about.

"We haven't changed in thousands of years," I said dryly. "Millions of years, probably. Why should we start now?"

"Because you're _better_ than that!" The sheer passion in his voice stopped me, made me look up at him, take him seriously. He was always doing that to me. Making me look at things differently. "You have so much potential. You do so many great things!"

"And then we fuck it up," I answered, deliberately destroying the mood. I had no faith in human nature, as he well knew. "Like always."

He shook his head vigorously, curls flying everywhere like always, ready to dispute the point with me like always. "No no no no no," he insisted. "_Not_ always. Look at you--you've changed so much since I met you."

That caught me out. "No I haven't," I answered automatically even as I considered his words.

"Yes you have," he countered in that rather-adorable-but-still-infuriatingly-childish way of his. "You're not half so dour as when I met you. Even your sarcasm isn't as biting!" I unconsciously grinned at that. He grinned back, laughing at me, with me, already brightening out of his blue funk. "You see? You even smile more!"

He _made_ me smile. I watched him stare up at the afternoon sky for a half-hour once, caught up in its deep cloudlessness. I watched him be entranced by an episode of _Battlestar Galactica_, fascinated by the characters, the plots, the setting, even as I made fun of it in that special MST3K kind of way. I watched him breathe in the scent of a lilac bush, then delicately pick one of the blossoms off to give to me. And I breathed in the scent as deeply as he did.

He made me appreciate things like I never had before. He was utterly…magical that way. It was like learning how to live when I spent time with him.

And he seemed to enjoy my company. I couldn't tell why, didn't know why'd he just suddenly sat down with me one day and stuck around for so long. I've always been too candid, too direct, for people to be comfortable with me. I've always been too cold, too hard--but the Doctor was changing that, changing me. And for once, I didn't resent the change. Well, too much anyway.

I hadn't wanted to admit it, but I had been lonely before I met him. He filled up my life, made it real, made it _mean_ something. He was wonderful.

He was also mysterious as hell. I didn't _really_ know anything about him--yes, he was knowledgeable, intelligent, well traveled (or so he seemed to let slip)...but who _was_ he? Where did he live? Was he divorced? Why did he spend so much time with me? There was so much I didn't know about him.

"Why can't I see where you live?" I teasingly whined at him one Sunday afternoon, even though I meant the question in all seriousness. We'd just finished an _Invisible Man_ marathon, sprawled on the floor in front of my couch.

He shook his head. I'd persuaded him to take off his frock coat and cravat; he sat in his shirtsleeves and unbuttoned vest, looking peculiarly vulnerable without the velvet. His face had that blank look I hated, that distant, unreachable look that made him seem so...alien. As if the man I knew were a sham, a facade covering up who he really was. "No no no, not yet, Carrie. Not _yet_. Perhaps someday I'll show it to you..."

I frowned at him consideringly. He looked back at me, almost nervously. "Yes?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Are you ticklish?"

The question was obviously unexpected. For an instant he looked surprised, then he flinched, very slightly. I would have missed it if I hadn't been paying close attention. "No," he answered quickly.

An evil little grin played around my lips. "I think you are."

"I'm not, I assure you," he retorted, shifting away from me ever so slightly. It looked like an unconscious movement, as if he couldn't control himself, or hadn't even realized he'd done it. "And I wouldn't suggest finding out."

I lunged at him, fingers finding his sides, his knee, his neck. His reaction was immediate and extreme--he collapsed into a giggling bundle, making wiggling, useless attempts to fend me off. It was hilarious to see him, reduced to helpless laughter on my living room carpet like that. Tears were streaming out of his eyes. I thought he was gonna hyperventilate.

At long last he managed to gasp out between laughs and catching his breath, "It's not fair this body is so susceptible to tickling. If any of my enemies found out about this I'd never live it down! And they'd have the perfect way to defeat me..." At my confused look, he added, waving a dismissive, "Never-mind-it's-not-important" hand, "Never mind, it's not important." He had his breath back by this time, and now he gave me an appraising look. "And just how ticklish are _you_?"

"Oh no," I said, jumping up. "Oh no you don't." I screamed when he also jumped up, and we ran out of the room, laughing.

He chased me around my apartment, and we ended up back in the living room. He caught me, tripped me onto the couch, and proceeded to tickle me unmercifully. I had never laughed so much in such a short time in my entire life. I thought I was gonna throw up. My sides and jaw were killing me.

This went on for months--the two of us meeting for lunch at the cafe or at whatever place took our fancy the Friday before the weekend, hanging out together for long periods of time. Probably the oddest relationship you'd ever come across--we didn't do odd things exactly, it was just the nature of the relationship itself. And the fact that the Doctor's just a strange man to begin with.

There was a week when he seemed particularly depressed--broody. He didn't cheer up nearly so quickly or so much as he usually did when I met him in a bad mood. And I wanted to cheer him up, like he always made me do. I wanted to return the favor.

So at lunch that Friday I said, "Doctor, we have a date tonight."

He looked up at me warily, his fork left forgotten halfway to his mouth. "Oh, we do?"

"Yes," I said precisely. "I am taking you to see a show at the local theatre--I managed to get us a couple tickets--and then we're going to dinner at the Court restaurant."

"But--"

"No buts," I cut him off. "I want you to meet me at my place at seven so we have plenty of time to get to the show before eight."

He frowned at me for a moment, and suddenly I was afraid he'd tell me no. And in that instant, everything was crashing around me--our friendship, my life, the world. Then he nodded solemnly, without his usual smile, and said, "All right. I'll be at your flat at seven."

And he was. After that little moment, I'd spent the entire afternoon worried he wouldn't show, worried about what was bothering him and wishing he'd tell me more about himself so I could try to help. But he promptly rang my doorbell at seven, wearing his wing-collared shirt and velvet frock coat that shimmered in whatever light happened to fall on it.

I'd put on my only skirt, a long black one, and one of my nicer tops. I'd also curled my long, straight hair and even put on a little makeup. I don't think the Doctor noticed at all--he still seemed preoccupied. He took my arm and led me to my car.

He livened up at the play as I'd hoped he would, watching the stage with fascinated delight, barely taking his eyes off the action taking place onstage. It was a production of _Much Ado About Nothing_, very fun, and it seemed to cheer him up considerably.

I was relieved, pleased, excited, proud I could make him happy. It was dizzying, all the emotions running through me. I'd never felt anything so much--so strongly--before I met the Doctor, not even as a kid. I felt giddy with excitement at the possibilities.

We decided to leave my car in the theatre parking lot and walk to the restaurant since it wasn't that far away. We were acting silly, running down back alleys and singing loudly. After dinner, we were walking back much more sedately when someone--several someones--stepped away from the black walls of the alley and surrounded us.

I was abruptly terrified, my whole evening ruined. This was insane. This sort of thing didn't happen to people like me in real life. How many others had said that before me?

They were all young, younger than me, and dangerous-looking. Of course. They had knives, maybe even guns. They were probably the ones who'd attacked other people on nights like this, the ones that had made the Doctor snap out in anger at the whole world when reading my newspaper.

"Hi there," said one of them in a soft voice. There were four--five?--of them. All in dark clothes, all with weapons. I couldn't breathe. "Now if you just give us your money and valuables, we'll let you go."

I doubted that. I really doubted that. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't look at them, in case they looked back at me. I couldn't look at the Doctor, in case they looked at _him_. I'd never felt so bloody helpless in my life. It would have been galling if I wasn't so scared. I just hoped I'd have the chance to be pissed off later.

"You don't want to do this," the Doctor said quietly.

My heart stopped beating right about then too. Technically I should already have been dead.

"You don't _have_ to do this," he went on. His voice probably sounded calm to those people, but by then I knew his voice, his body language, _him_, well enough to recognize the tension in him. And suddenly I was afraid of him as well. The alien was back, the wrongness I couldn't understand, and it was worse than I'd ever seen it before. He seemed completely different. "You know it's wrong."

The earlier speaker--the leader?--laughed. "Yeah, so what's your point?"

"My point," the Doctor went on quietly but with so much anger even the boys with the weapons listened, "is that this is _wrong_. You won't get away with it. So put down your weapons and let us go."

"Why should we?" sneered another of them, but it sounded just a little forced.

The Doctor stepped up to him. Stepped right up to him, and took the knife out of the kid's hand, and threw it violently against the brick wall, and breathed in the boy's ear, "Because you're more uncertain of yourself than I will ever be afraid of bullies like you."

I was petrified. So when the Doctor grabbed my hand and pulled me away, I stumbled, turning my ankle badly in my high heel. But somehow the Doctor got me out of that alley, both of us running and stumbling to my car, which thankfully wasn't very far away.

I was sobbing by the time we reached the parking lot. The Doctor had to gently but forcefully take my purse from me and get my keys. He put me in the passenger seat and sat down on the driver's side. I just sat there and shook convulsively and bawled for the first time since I was seven. Or maybe six.

After a year--ten minutes in real time--I managed to calm down enough that I was only occasionally sniffling or hiccuping. The Doctor waited through it all patiently, not quite looking at me, then started the car and pulled out of the lot.

A couple minutes later, my voice informed him, "This isn't the way to my home."

"I know," he said, not taking his eyes off the road. "I'm taking you to my home. We need to do something about your ankle, and I don't think I should leave you alone tonight."

"We should go to the police," my voice was numb, distant.

"That can wait until tomorrow," he said. "Right now we need to take care of you."

I blanked out after that; at least, I paid no attention to anything outside the world of my head and the constantly replaying scene of what had just happened. The Doctor coaxed me out of the car--we were in another alley. I grabbed his velvet-coated arm, latched onto it, about ready to scream. He curled his other hand around my arm and held it reassuringly, leading me to a large blue box.

I stared at it stupidly. _It's a large blue box_ my mind kept repeating to itself. It couldn't seem to quite get beyond that thought.

The Doctor unlocked the door to the large blue box and escorted me inside.

And there was no way in hell we were in that big blue box anymore.

"It's a TARDIS," he breathed in my ear from my side. I think by that point he was literally holding me up with his hand on my arm. My ankle was killing me. "A time and space machine. And yes, it's bigger inside than out."

And then he picked me up and carried me out of the first room, down a long corridor and into a bedroom. He sat me down on the bed, disappeared, and came back with some bandages and damp cloths, becoming the perfect nurse. He gave me something to swallow that completely took the pain away and would, he said, relieve any damage done to my ankle. Then he held out a nightshirt and robe and said, "You can spend the night here—the console room's just down the corridor, to the left; that's probably where I'll be all night if you need me."

"Wait," I called out as he was almost out the door. He turned around in the doorway, a little unwillingly I thought, and blinked at me patiently, that impassive, remote look on his face again. _Damn you, don't DO that!_ I thought at him angrily but left the words unsaid. "I…you--this place...what happened? I don't understand."

He laughed at me softly. "So many questions," he said almost to himself. "I'll try to give you some more answers--but it can wait till tomorrow morning, when you're not in shock and can think more clearly."

I almost started crying again then, dammit. I wanted him to hold me, squeeze the life back into me--I was about ready to scream at him to hug me. I felt completely out of my depth, alone, still frightened. "Don't go yet," I said in as small a voice as I could, half-hoping he wouldn't hear me. I still had my pride after all.

His face softened, and he stepped back fully into the room. He pulled a chair up to the bed and sat down, taking my hands, his own shivery cold against mine. "That was a terrible experience tonight," he said in his soft, beautiful voice. "And I'm so, so sorry you had to go through it--you of all people don't deserve that kind of pain." His face and voice were for a moment angry, angry as always at the injustices he raged about when we talked. I felt a little better to know he cared so much. "So I want you to get some sleep now, try to relax at least a little bit, calm down. I'll explain more in the morning."

He got up to leave. "This is your home?" I asked him.

He turned back to me and smiled, his eyes shadowed by his golden-brown curls. "Yes," he said softly.

"And this is why I couldn't see it before?"

He looked pained for a moment, but then the expression was gone. "I wanted you to know me," he said inexplicably, another of his maddening enigmatic comments. "Not for what I am, but for _who_ I am. I wanted to have a different sort of friendship with someone--something you humans would probably consider more 'real.'" He sighed. "Yes, this is why you couldn't see my home before."

"I'm going to change," I said, "and then you're going to come back in here and sit there until I fall asleep--stay in that chair all night in case I wake up and need a reassuring voice. I think I have the right to ask for that after knowing you all this time."

He froze, then smiled shyly and nodded, slipping out of the room like a ghost. I quickly stepped into the nightshirt, crawled under the covers, and called him back into the room.

And he did stay with me all night.

* * *

"I travel," he told me the next morning. He'd made me breakfast in bed; I was sitting up with the tray in my lap; he kept stealing bites of toast or strawberries from me. "Around the Universe, anytime, any place."

I had to believe him. I was sitting in an impossibility--_he_ was an impossibility. This was the only way to explain him away, define him. "So you didn't want to tell me all this before 'cos you thought I'd think you were mad?" I nodded thoughtfully. Sure as hell made sense to me. At the moment, I felt like maybe _I_ was mad.

"No, I could easily have shown you this place and you would have had no choice but to believe me," he answered blandly. I blinked at him, mouth gaping wide. He looked plaintive, the definitive kicked puppy. Gawd he was so good at manipulating my emotions. "I've had many travelling companions," he said at last, as if in defeat. "Many--friends--who lived in the TARDIS with me, landing on other planets in other times and helping me fight evil."

I tried not to smirk. _Fight evil? Gawd you're a dork._

"I'm tired of that," he went on obliviously. "I _get_ tired of that--you humans take so many things for granted. Eating lunch in a cafe everyday. Watching television on a Saturday morning. Spending hours doing nothing more than talking with a friend about absolutely nothing. Your time is so linear, a straight progression forward. My life...I'm always running, trying to keep up with myself, with fighting the wrongs others do. And I question _my_ actions so often..."

"You needed a break," I said for him, my heart sinking.

"I needed a friend," he corrected. He watched my face as he spoke, his words gentle. "An ordinary friend, not someone depending upon me to save her life or his planet. Not someone who knew me for _what_ I am, but who I am. I thought perhaps…perhaps I could find out who I am in the process as well."

I studied his face for a long time in silence. "And somehow you picked me."

A smile flickered ruefully on his face. "You looked as lonely as I felt," he said.

"Perfect solution," I said distantly "When you're done spending time with me, you slip off to another planet, defeat a BEM, and come back in time to share a quick lunch and a random conversation with the occasional witty remark with me before running off again."

"I didn't want you to have to get involved." His voice was so intense, so passionate in its sincerity, its need to make me understand, that I found myself paying closer attention to the words even as I tried to resist listening to him. I wanted to be angry at him for making me feel used. "So many of my friends--my companions--have been hurt by the destruction they've seen. Destruction they've helped me cause. I didn't want you to be changed like that."

I snorted. "All your positive influences without any of your negative ones?" I knew he was dangerous; I'd seen it last night, had had glimpses of it before. He had frightened me last night, standing up to those boys.

He seemed defeated, slumping in his chair next to my bed. "If you like." He shrugged in resignation. "I wanted something different, Carrie."

"It certainly sounds like you had it." I paused, then asked with difficulty, "Why me? Seriously."

It was the Doctor's turn to study me. "I liked you," he said with a simplicity that made me want both to hug him and grind my teeth in frustration. "I liked you when I first saw you, I liked you when you weren't fazed by me, I liked you when you were sarcastic to me. I still like you."

Man, that was a confidence booster. But then, when you're used to not being very well-liked, having the proverbial tall, dark, handsome, mysterious stranger tell you he likes your company would make any day well-nigh perfect.

"Well, if it's any consolation," I told him with a smile, "I like you too."

He grinned back, childishly pleased again, and got up to make the breakfast tray magically disappear. He was at the door again when I stopped him. "Doctor..."

He turned around inquiringly. "What's your name?" I asked tentatively.

I'd been wanting to ask him that again for a long time but had never quite got the courage to do so. It'd been easier to accept him merely as the Doctor when I'd first met him, but as the months passed...the title became wrong somehow. Perhaps it went back to what he'd said before--I knew him for _who_ he was, not what. Or maybe I just knew him as a different person from the rest of the universe.

He paused. "I've forgotten my real name," he said at last. I knew he was being honest. "Or at least, it's been buried so long I can't find it anymore. I've had many other names, but none of them really suited me. The Doctor's always worked...until now." He seemed to realize as well that he _wasn't_ the Doctor to me.

"I guess we're both stuck with it then," I said to fill up the silence.

He nodded, troubled look on his face. "I'll be back in a minute to show you the wardrobe room," he said at last and left the room.

* * *

When he said wardrobe room, he really meant wardrobe room.

I think I was about ready to nest in there quite happily for the rest of my life when the Doctor knocked on the door and asked if I was ready to come out. I reluctantly did but brightened up at the prospect of exploring his--home. After all, he ain't the only one with curiosity. Maybe I'd finally get a _few_ of my questions about him answered. My ankle didn't hurt at all and appeared fine again, so walking about wasn't even a problem.

The place was a monstrosity. It had everything--I mean _everything_. Except other people. He appeared to be utterly alone in the place--but then, from what I could gather, he and I only actually wandered through a tiny fraction of the entire ship.

"You don't have any friends with you now?" I asked as we paused in what appeared to be a sculpture gallery. There was no way in hell all those sculptures came from Earth...or at least, the statues weren't all depicting humans... "Travelling, I mean?"

"No," he replied. "I just said good-bye to someone, and lately I've been spending a lot of time with you on Earth...I'll find someone, or they'll find me is more likely. Eventually. They always do. In some ways, actually, I _am_ travelling with someone right now. In other ways, I haven't had a companion in years." He shrugged, smiling at me sheepishly. "Time travel's always a bit complicated. Depending on your point of view."

"Why do you keep it up if you're tired of it?"

He stopped walking. We were in another corridor, passing the occasional opened or closed door. I peeked in at the opened ones, getting glimpses of a vast array of shoes and boots, other bedrooms, a piano and music stand, what looked liked like a massive train set.

"I'm _not_ tired of it," he said. "Anyway, I _have_ to keep it up. There's too much left for me to do. I get involved in things, you see--it's my nature."

"Who you are?" I added quietly.

He winced ruefully. "Yes," he agreed readily. "I don't want to stop travelling, Carrie. I don't want to give up. Stop fighting. I don't think I could even if I _did_ want to."

"You feel responsible for the universe or something?" I frowned, my habitual sardonic frown. "Talk about an overinflated sense of self-importance."

He frowned back at me. I couldn't really blame him. "I know I can be arrogant," he told me candidly. "And perhaps in the past I _have_ taken what I feel to be my--responsibilities--too far. But when I land on a planet and see something is wrong, I can't let it go unchanged. I have to at least try to fight it."

I drew back from him. My turn to stop our leisurely walk. "What gives you the right to say it's wrong?" I asked suspiciously.

"You haven't seen what I have," he answered. "Places where the majority of people are slaves. Populations or entire planets used for scientific experiments, for exploitation, and then carelessly abandoned. Wars that never end--literally. Monsters and megalomaniacs."

"And this gives you the right to interfere?" I held his gaze, refused to let him look away.

"Perhaps not, sometimes," he said after consideration. I had no idea what he was thinking about, realized I probably never _had_ had a clue, never could know. I wondered what he was remembering. "But we all do what we think is best." The words were hollow; he seemed old and world-weary again. He held his hands up to stop further protests from me. "I know how you feel about outside interference," he said. "We've discussed your isolationistic tendencies many times before, Carrie."

"Another reason you never asked me to go with you?" I asked with a delicately raised eyebrow. "You knew I'd never agree with what you do? That I'd hold you accountable no matter how 'responsible' you felt? You wouldn't be able to rationalize to me what you do."

"Somehow I think your feelings would change if you actually saw some of these places--Skaro. Terra Alpha." He gave me a measuring stare. "Would you really want to go with me and find out?"

I had to look away. "No--I don't know. I need to think." I started walking again quickly, hoping he'd also want to drop the subject.

Thankfully he did. We left the TARDIS soon after that; the Doctor had finally agreed we should talk to the police about the night before. With all that had happened since, I'd almost forgotten about the...attack.

His world was insane.

I didn't understand what I was feeling. I had thought I was getting to know him--sure, I knew almost no details about his personal life, but I knew his personality. His likes, dislikes, views on various subjects, what made him laugh, how he stood when he was angry or happy, what he put in his tea. I thought we were friends, like so many other normal people were friends, spending time with each other, even if neither of us were what could be considered "normal." And then in the span of less than twelve hours I found I'd known only half of him--less than half of him. He'd been keeping his real life secret from me the entire time.

And as to that real life...I could understand why he'd want to get away from it once in a while, if it was anything at all like last night (and from some of what he started to tell me, last night was comparatively small-scale and easy to deal with). I could understand why he would want a fairly uncomplicated friendship with someone nice and relatively normal and worried only about trivialities, like what to eat for dinner and what to do with her insignificant life. It was flattering in a way, that he'd wanted to get to know me, treat me specially, different from his other friends. But I resented being "special," being the one he _didn't_ travel with. I wanted to have the adventure just like everyone else.

Or did I?

* * *

After that rather informative weekend, I insisted on spending time at _his_ place as well. So sometimes instead of vegging out at my apartment or wandering around the city, we explored his TARDIS. I read some books from the amazing library, curled up in an easy chair watching him tinker with the "console" (or, more likely, dozing), took a swim in the pool, communed with the butterflies, argued with him about why the hell he felt this need to take care of the universe and everyone in it, fooled around on the piano (it'd been ages since I'd played, even longer since I'd had lessons). He was relaxed in his TARDIS, unlike anywhere else. Even when we just watched TV in my apartment or took a walk in the park, he was always excited, always interested, always restless, always finding something new. But in his ship, he was quiet...older. Like an old, old man enjoying his retirement. We might spend an afternoon listening to music together, or he'd indulgently watch me from an easy chair while I prowled around his console room. I always found some new interesting bits in that room, every time I came back.

While he calmed down in his home, I got more excitable. It was part nerves, I think--the place felt off to me, alien. Not unwelcoming exactly; I just new I didn't fit in there. And I was always afraid he'd take off with me stuck inside, and I'd never get home.

I've never dealt well with change. Or chance. Or uncertainty. And the Doctor's life definitely appeared all those...he opened up more, after he showed me his home. Told me more about himself, his past. It was both fascinating and terrifying. He'd done so much. It sounded like he'd lived forever.

He never asked me to go with him, not after that first day in his TARDIS when we went exploring--and even that first time wasn't really an offer, just a hypothetical "Would you if you could?" sort of thing. I was grateful and apprehensive that he hadn't said anything else since then. I was waiting for him to ask again, for real this time. I didn't know how I'd answer, but I had a foreboding.

It was strange. My life seemed to be on hold in a way. There was work and there was time with the Doctor. Weekday evenings, Sunday nights (I spent the weekends in the TARDIS, sleeping in the same bedroom I'd used that first night) when he wasn't around meant nothing, were nothing. Which wasn't anything new or unusual; I'd never had a social life. The only real difference was time with the Doctor. And work and time after work really paled in comparison to that.

I don't know how much time passed for him. After all, he was always slipping off after one of our lunch dates, our weekends. I stayed behind one weekend--waited to see what would happen when his big blue box took him away. When the noise filled the alley and the big blue box disappeared, I almost screamed. Whether from joy or fear or a combination of the two I don't know. But it was only after seeing that that I was afraid the Doctor would leave with me still in his ship.

And he was getting restless too. Tired of the same cafe, the same city--my company as well, probably. He only came for the weekends and an hour every weekday but already he couldn't stand that much grounding, was itching to be utterly and completely free again. He was no closer to home than he'd ever been. I understood now, better, why he couldn't stop travelling, couldn't stop interfering. He was right; it was his nature, who he was. All part of his charm. Probably. But it wasn't who _I_ was.

I knew this friendship of ours was gonna end. He was too restless, I was too uncomfortable. _I_ was the alien in his TARDIS, the one who didn't belong. It was the Doctor's home, not mine, no matter how many weekends I spent there with him. I wondered if he felt the same way when he spent time with me, spent so much time on Earth. Like he didn't fit in.

I was getting moody, more snappish and intimidating than I'd been even before I met him. I was afraid, knowing he'd have to leave and I'd have to stay. I didn't want this bizarre relationship to change or end. And I knew it'd have to.

"What's wrong this time, Carrie?" he asked me one weekend. It'd been almost a year since I met him, another gorgeous spring day. I was stomping around, angry for some reason.

"Nothing," I scowled and flung myself into an easy chair.

He watched me from the console, an amused and patient look about his stance, his face. It only infuriated me more. "Don't mind the silly little human," I flared at him, "I'm just having one of those days."

He sighed. "You're not a silly little human," he told me, coming over and sitting down across from me.

"Unless _all_ humans are silly and little, right?" I shot back.

"If you like," he smiled, trying to humor me or get me in a better mood. It didn't work. His smile collapsed and he sighed, sitting back in his chair. "What's_ really_ wrong, Carrie?"

I shrugged in a calculated-to-be-maddeningly-indifferent way. I don't think it affected him. "I don't know," I told him, though I had my suspicions.

"Why don't we do something?" he suggested with an impulsive grin, his adorable childlike one, designed to perk me up. That didn't work either. "Go somewhere."

"We've done all the local stuff," I pointed out, feeling depressed. "The last time I suggested going to the art museum again I thought you were gonna have a hissy fit."

"I don't have hissy fits," he said with dignity. It looked and sounded all wrong. At least it pulled a reluctant smile from me. "Then why don't we go someplace further afield?"

I snorted. "Somehow I don't think we could get very far or do very much on a weekend road trip," I remarked. I held up my hand before he could speak. "And I don't have money for a train or plane ticket."

He subsided, giving me a long, considering look. I pulled my legs up on the chair under me, curling around myself. "What?" I asked suspiciously.

He opened his mouth to speak, paused, closed it, opened it again. "Would you like to take a trip with me in the TARDIS?"

I froze. There it was, what I'd expected and dreaded. Now I _really_ had to decide.

I stood up, unable to sit still anymore, and wandered the room, ending up by the console. I stared into the time rotor. "I...y-no."

Through the rotor, I saw his face crumple behind me. "Carrie..." he trailed off and stood up, heading toward me.

I turned to face him. "No," I repeated. "I can't go with you." I circled around the console, putting more space between him and me. "And you can't stay here any longer. I know you're going stir crazy, spending so much time here. You're over your slump or depression or self-doubts or _whatever_ it was that was keeping you here. You're ready to go off and save the universe twice a day again like usual."

"But I don't--"

"Don't what?" I cut him off irritably. "Don't want to leave me here? You told me yourself, you're used to saying good-bye to people."

"Don't want to hurt you," he corrected me. "That was a serious offer, Carrie."

I looked him in the eye but kept my distance. "I know it was," I said. "And thank you, thank you very much. But you know I...I don't fit in with that kind of life." I smiled at him lop-sidedly. "I've always hated travelling, Doctor."

He took a step back at that; I never called him...anything. Never had to. It was always just him and me. He and I. He didn't need a name or title—he hardly ever called me Carrie, either. I walked up to him and gave him a quick hug. "You are a wonderful guy. Even without saving Earth or Planet X or whatever, you are a beautiful person. Don't forget that. Don't think you have to be responsible for others' stupid actions, or that you have to take care of the universe, or whatever it is that keeps driving you on like this." I grinned up at him. "Just keep making people smile, okay? Now lemme out of here. I've gotta go out and smell some lilac bushes."

He caught my hand when I would have fled up to the main doors. I turned back to scowl at him. "I'll see you again," he told me, braving my fierce look. "I do have a habit of running into my friends again, you know. Eventually."

I allowed myself to soften the scowl. "You'll know where to find me," I said. "Same time, same cafe. Tune in tomorrow."

He let me go and walked over to the console, opening the main doors. Like the ass that I am at heart, I looked back at him when I reached the doors. Still in that damned sexy velvet, still with that childlike frown on his face. I waved and fled the room.

I stood outside the police box and waited. It was only the second time I'd seen his TARDIS dematerialize. I didn't scream or cry or let out a whoop of delight because he was back to doing what he thought he did best when it disappeared.

I just walked away.

* * *

He wasn't at the cafe on Monday--or Tuesday--or the rest of the week. I found myself that weekend driving hap-hazardedly in the direction of the alley he always landed the TARDIS in--but he wasn't there then either.

I had expected that. Really.

But it was still a disappointment. We're stupid that way, wanting what we've already told ourselves to give up. Wanting what we know we'd hate if we actually had.

I still had to wonder, though. _Would_ I have hated travelling with him? Would I have always been in conflict with him, for wanting to interfere? Would I have been too scared to do anything other than stand in the back and hope no one noticed me?

Or would I have had fun? Would I have learned so much that whatever bad experiences I might have had, they would have been worth it for all the other stuff? Could I have learned how to fly by aiming for the ground and missing? Could I have made Spock smile? Could I have kicked Darth Vader's ass?

I don't think I'll ever see the Doctor again. I don't think I should. It would ruin what we had, I think...or maybe it would just hurt too much to see him again. I wonder if he remembers me? I'd like to think he did...the friend he came to, instead of taking away. 

I can't believe I let him go.

__

"To her [he] was magic. How do you say good-bye to that?" ~Darien Fawkes, The Invisible Man


End file.
